beer ASK WHEEBZ

So last night I just bottled my second beer ever. It is a porter recipe kit from northern brewer. On brew day as I was about to take my OG, wouldn't ya know, I broke the frickin hydrometer. So no dice on the OG, however I followed the recipe very closely so I must have been on or near (in theory) my target OG which was 1.052. Well when I went to take my FG, with out thinking, I took the FG AFTER adding my priming solution, and my reading was 1.020.

Did taking the reading after adding the priming sugar solution throw off my FG? Because if the reading holds true, that makes this beer like 4.5%abv... what in the heck is up with the poor attenuation rate?
 
wheebz will be able to give you the correct answer here but to my way of thinking just take an SG reading when you open the first bottle to sample it.
 
It will, particularly if the hydrometer is dirty.

Basically knock the carbonation out of solution by pouring the beer back and forth between two jugs, then leave it to sit for 5 minutes and repeat.

However, I think it's a waste of beer.. The only reason we do it in professional brewing is for tax office paperwork. I wouldn't waste a drop of home brew. The best hydrometer is your mouth at this point.

After years of working in a cask only brewery (where final gravity is so much more important and noticeable than in keg or bottle) by taste I could guess the final sg - hydrometer tests said I was right 9 times out of ten and not far out the other 10% of the time. It takes practice! You just gotta brew and drink alot
 
are you brewing in japan?
if so... out of curiosity, are there alot of beer drinkers in japan? seems like you might be a rare commodity.
 
yeah i am

www.brimmerbrewing.com

the craft beer scene is really taking off here, it's still small compared to the UK/US etc.
there's about 200 breweries in Japan, but yes good brewers are a rare commodity. theres a lot of awful beer being made, but it sells because of the souvenier culture people have. 'i went to nagano and there was a small brewery there so i bought beer back for everyone at work' etc etc

there's alot of beer drinkers here (people loooove to get drunk, and it's totally fine to come to work hungover because you have to go drinking with work mates after work sometimes). sadly people are mainly drinking macro beer and beer tax is extremely high!

but when you have a nation of 127million people, theres always someone who wants a beer ;)

also craft brewing has only been around here since 1995 when they changed the laws... which means the big 4 (asahi, kirin, suntory, sapporo) who have been brewing a long time... had a big head start. for examples alot of bars can't carry craft beer cause a macro paid for all their fridges, servers etc,

Kirin went one further by inventing the 'kirin diamond' coupler.and keg which means you can only serve kirin beer because normal i.e sankey kegs, wont hook up at all. crafty lads!
 
so this cool motherf&^#$* walked into my brewery yesterday

i literally said out loud, "holy shit"

got giddy as a school girl, it was one of the best days ever, this is why I became a brewer

for those that dont know, this is Charlie Papazian, head and founder of the Brewers Association, writer of many homebrew books and pro brewing articles, and quite possibly the most recognizable beer celebrity in the brewing world, and this guy came to my brewery, FROM COLORADO, just to drink the Charapa beer I have on draft

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georgej said:
It will, particularly if the hydrometer is dirty.

Basically knock the carbonation out of solution by pouring the beer back and forth between two jugs, then leave it to sit for 5 minutes and repeat.

However, I think it's a waste of beer.. The only reason we do it in professional brewing is for tax office paperwork. I wouldn't waste a drop of home brew. The best hydrometer is your mouth at this point.

After years of working in a cask only brewery (where final gravity is so much more important and noticeable than in keg or bottle) by taste I could guess the final sg - hydrometer tests said I was right 9 times out of ten and not far out the other 10% of the time. It takes practice! You just gotta brew and drink alot
Click to expand...

exactly what this guy said, to the T

and if you finished at 1.020, that kind of sucks, but there are a couple factors, all including what he said in the above post, that might affect that reading, plus you have to look at temperature as well while you are doing a reading and account for what the hydrometer is zero'd to

and dude thats awesome as shit that you are brewing in japan

I have heard a lot of good stuff from the up and coming beer scene in japan, and I would love to make a trip out there
 
Cool for you whebbzy! Did you give him some of MY HOPPS beer? I bet he loved it better than your swill. :rofl:

Does Darwin always look like Captain Stressfactor?
 
What is it wheebz, a year maybe that you've been there and the man is traveling to try your beer, that's awesome there!
 
Hit me up if you ever make it out here dude!
I am the only English brewer here to my knowledge.

That's huge kudos having papazian come to drink your beer. I was giddy enough when Roger protz came to our brewery in the UK (dark star) and papazian is a much bigger name.
A mate of mine met him at cbc 2011,accidently called him 'Mr parmazan'... Mr papazian turned heels and walked off haha
 
I have been reading a book called "Sacred and Herbal Healing Beers The Secrets of Ancient Fermentation" by Stephen H. Buhner and found another book by Randy Mosher, was he one of your teachers at SIEBAL, called "Radical Brewing" These books talk about brewing history and to a great deal how brewing was done before Hops, something that I have alot of interest in. There are some really wild things that have been used in lue of hops and I'm thinking that after the first of the year I may start to play around with some of these in small batches, say 1 to 3 gallons and see what happens.

Humm, Pine Needle Ale, yummy :)
 
Christmas tree beer...I have had a beer brewed with pine needles before... But me minds a blank and can't recall the name. It was back before I had my new mouth for beer, so I thought it was gross. I'd have to give it another try.
 
Moonlight do an amazing beer called 'brewing for tips' that uses redwood tips instead of hops. Was lucky enough to meet doug years ago when he went on holiday to England. Great beer!
 
That's cool george, I have to projects that I'm working on currently that will be what I consider alternate styles. Well, really one is an alternate style because I won't use hops but there will be some alternate fermentables in it too. The other is a Stout or Porter that is going to use alternate bittering. This is the part of brewing that I am really enjoying. I'm also considering making these the first AG brews too.

However, I did see in the Northern Brewer catalog today that they not have a Marris Otter LME for sale, interesting.
 
RocketMan said:
I have been reading a book called "Sacred and Herbal Healing Beers The Secrets of Ancient Fermentation" by Stephen H. Buhner and found another book by Randy Mosher, was he one of your teachers at SIEBAL, called "Radical Brewing" These books talk about brewing history and to a great deal how brewing was done before Hops, something that I have alot of interest in. There are some really wild things that have been used in lue of hops and I'm thinking that after the first of the year I may start to play around with some of these in small batches, say 1 to 3 gallons and see what happens.

Humm, Pine Needle Ale, yummy :)
Click to expand...

have both of them sitting behind me at my desk at work
 
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